Lost in translation
by Peruna
Summary: So, time travel is a thing. As are dissatisfied might-as-well-be-gods, determined to meddle with humanity long after their own passing. None of which is known to Ezio when he first meets a foreigner on the rooftops of Florence. OC-Insert, Time Travel, depictions of blood and violence
1. I no speak Italiano

Because I'm a sucker for Self-Inserts and have been reading too many Assassin's Creed fanfictions. It's been forever since I played AC2, so please excuse any inconsistencies, I'll get on it as soon as I'm back home.

I do not own Assassin's Creed.

* * *

Ezio is on his way home when he is hailed. Confused he turns to find a man waving at him like a fool, standing on a rooftop some ways away. The man is no guard, merely a slim figure in a wide cloak with no visible sword or armour. With no little curiosity, Ezio decides to find out what the stranger wants. It's not often he sees anybody but guards or his brother on the rooftops of Firenze, after all.

When he sets forward to approach, the stranger does the same, jumping over streets with some ease, though it isn't as natural as Federico would manage. Like he knows the movements but isn't used to them. Still, it's better than most city guards would manage, Ezio thinks, now even more interested in the stranger's identity.

He's just about to greet the man, having both landed on the same rooftop, when the stranger starts speaking in a manner so alien and broken it throws him off-guard.

"You Auditore, yes?" the stranger asks, his pronounciation so twisted and wrong that Ezio has to take a moment to understand what he means.

"Yes," he answers bemusedly, "Yes, my name is Ezio Auditore and who might you be?"

For a long moment the stranger stares at him, intensely, a little unnervingly if he's honest. The man's whole appearance is strange and alien, clearly a foreigner. If his atrocious manner of speaking wasn't clue enough, then the pale skin and light hair surely would be. And that cut to the hair-

"You Auditore," the stranger repeats, more forcefully, pulling Ezio out of his musings.

"Yes," he answers again, annoyed.

"Yes," the other man parrots, nodding, then pointing straight at Ezio in a decidedly rude manner. "You family," he says, before balling his hand to a fist and jerking it up while making a _krk_ sound and tilting his head.

"Excuse me?" What on god's green earth was this stranger trying to tell him?

"You family," he says, then repeats the motion and the sound and then Ezio has the horrible feeling he knows what the man is trying to say. "You family, _krk_." Oh yes, a third demonstration doesn't make Ezio feel any better about this.

"Are you threatening me?!" he demands, stepping toward the stranger who lowers his arm. Again, the stranger stares at him intensely and with, he realizes, incomprehension. Does this man not speak any Italian? And if so, why threaten his family if he can't even do it properly?

"You family," the stranger starts again, pointing at Ezio, "Family friend," he says and shakes his head, "No friend."

"What?"

"You family friend no friend!"

"I have no idea what you are talking of!" Ezio hisses, frustrated and angry, "But you will regret threatening me!"

The stanger's gaze trails down to where Ezio is gripping his sword's hilt and he seems to understand the gesture better than any words for lifts his arms in surrender and shakes is head.

"No, no. I no..." Pulling a face the stranger rubs a hand over his weirdly cut hair, short on one side and long on the other, before pointing at Ezio again. "You family. Friend no friend." Again, he grimaces. "Friend. _Et tu brute._"

That last phrase was Latin, that much Ezio knows, but it's as much a puzzle to him as everything else the stranger had said, so he disregards it for now, focussing on the threat. He takes another aggressive step forward and starts unsheating his sword.

Finally the man backs away, his hands once again in the air. "_Okay, okay_," he says, whatever that is supposed to mean, before turning and fleeing. It should have been a victory, but all Ezio feels is unsettled. He resheats his sword and watches the retreating figure disappear between two roofs, no doubt taking to the streets to get out of his sight. Then, with a queasy feeling, he heads home to seek out his father.

-o-

"And he said nothing else?"

"He only said '_Et tu brute_'. What does that mean?"

"_Et tu brute_," Giovanni repeats thoughtfully. It could mean a great many things. Maybe the mysterious stranger was calling his son an idiot and given how they apparently had trouble understanding each other, it seems plausible enough. Or maybe he was referencing something, a figure of ancient Roman history possibly, there had been a family whose by-name had been Brutus. He frowns. "And you are certain he was threatening you?"

"What else could that have been? He was talking about our family hanging!" Ezio is pacing agitatedly in his office. Not even his occasional scuffles with the de Pazzi boy leave him in such a mood, even if Vieri throws a lot more insult his way.

"He _talked_ about it? What did he say, exactly?" Giovanni presses.

"Nothing!" Ezio nearly shouts, frustrated and worried, obviously, by his encounter with the stranger. "He was talking with his hands, just saying 'You family. You family' and-" His son grimaces, before repeating the motion the stranger had used to convey the word "hanging". Giovanni understands why it so unsettled his son, he doesn't enjoy the picture it conjures either.

"Are you certain he was threatening us?" It seems incongruous, for a foreigner to approach them like that. He could have been employed by someone else to deliver the message, Giovanni had made enough enemies for himself as an Assassin, but that would mean his identity has been found out, which was a more unsettling thought than the threat itself. He's been investigating de Pazzi for murder and conspiracy and if that man got word of his identity it could spell disaster.

"I don't know! He couldn't speak three straight words! All he said was 'You family' and 'Friend' and 'No Friend'! How am I to know what he meant?!"

"Calm down, Ezio," he scolds and watches as his son forces himself to seize his useless pacing. "Now, was he in any way aggressive?"

Ezio narrows his eyes and scowls. "He kept pointing at me," he says, sounding none too convinced.

"Except for that. Did he draw a sword? What was his posture?"

Sighing defeatedly, the boy shakes his head. "He didn't even carry a sword. And when I made to draw mine, he backed off."

"So you scared him off easily?" Giovanni hums thoughtfully while his son looks off to the side. So the stranger might have been a mere messenger for the threat, or he might not have threatened at all and instead been delivering a warning. "See if you can find this man," he orders his son and looking out the window at the darkening sky, "After dinner."

Ezio nods with a quiet "Of course, father" before leaving his study. Giovanni looks after his son, before drawing a paper from his desk to pen a quick note to la Volpe. Maybe the thief master knew anything of the stranger or maybe he has any news on the de Pazzis' movements. Even if he isn't sure about the stranger's motives, Giovanni will take the threat to his family's safety seriously.

It is too late to act on the warning though, a day later guards break down the palazzo's doors, arresting all Auditore men they can catch.

-o-

"No!" Ezio shouts, his voice drowned by the jeering of the crowd he's trying to push through, "That is a lie!" Up ahead, Gonfalonieri Alberti goes on with his sentence, the sentence for conspiracy, the sentence to _death for his brothers and father! _But the Gonfalonieri had been their _friend! _His father had _trusted him! _

He has to get through, but the crowd is too thick, he can barely make any headway, not fast enough, not fast eno-

Up ahead, the floor opens under his family and they fall. They fall. His father's face grim, Federico's as well and Petruccio's- Oh Petruccio is so scared. There is a horrible snapping sound and for one, heart-stopping, incomprehensible moment Ezio believes his family dead, their necks snapped by the jerk of the rope.

But then they keep falling, their bodies crumpeling to the ground and that's not supposed to happen and _Ezzio doesn't care! _He _needs _to get to them, more than he ever needed anything else, so he keeps pushing, desperate to reach their bodies.

When he sees his father getting up, tugging the rope off his neck and coughing harshly, Ezio's legs almost give out with the utter, all-emcompassing relief he feels. But he keeps going, he has to reach them, has to be certain they are alive. There is Federico as well, pushing to his feet, where is Petruccio, where is he?

By now the Gonfalonieri is screaming for the guards to apprehend them, and he's also pointing towards Ezio and there are men with swords drawn, but all he cares for is reaching his family. Finally he breaks from the crowd and there is only one more man, a guard, between him and his brothers.

The man isn't even aware of him, facing the unarmed Federico with a sword in his hand, and Ezio doesn't think before swinging his own sword towards the man's unprotected neck. There is blood and the man crumples and maybe Ezio feels a bit sick but mostly he's numb for everything that isn't the relief he feels seeing his littlest brother coughing on the ground.

He's not dead. There is a noose around his neck with a frayed end but he is not dead. Coughing means alive. They are all alive!

"Ezio!" Federico's voice sounds as if far away, coming closer. "Ezio, look out!" He turns just in time to see a sword swinging at him, barely able to stumble out of the way and then Federico is there with a sword of his own, fighting the guard off.

His father is by his side, clamping a hand on his shoulder. "Ezio, get Petruccio and run!" And then he is pulling a blade from Ezio's belt and whirls to defend against another guard.

Ezio stumbles over to Petruccio, but before he can kneel to help his brother, he has to deflect a strike from yet another guard. They are fully surrounded now and he can't- he doesn't know what to do, barely able to protect his vulnerable little brother, let alone get him away from here. And Petruccio is still on his hands and knees, too weak to stand and coughing horribly.

What should he do? What _can _he do? All around there is only fighting and people screaming and surely soon there will be even more guards.

"Run! My sons, run!" He can hear his father calling, but he can't, not with Petruccio-

There is someone else in their midst, slipping through the ring of guards when one tries forward only to meet Ezio's sword. Barely, he recognizes they don't hold a weapon. He doesn't know what they are, friend or foe, but the guards don't either. One goes to strike the interloper and Ezio reflexively defends. Tense and stressed, he tries to keep an eye on the newcomer who now crouches by Petruccio, which proves impossible with the amount of guards attacking him - have they multiplied?

He has to shift, put his back to Petruccio and the unknown and he hates it, but there are blades flashing and he's getting tired. There are nicks and cuts on his arms already from when he isn't quick enough to dodge or parry.

It feels like an eternity of desperate fighting, being pushed back further and further until he can see Federico from the corner of his eye. Their father is a whirl of blades and death on his other side, blood staining his clothes and Ezio fears, he fears that he may lose them, that this short reprieve from death is all they will be allowed. Should they die here, when they had so miraculously survived the execution attempt? Is it all for naught?

With his heart in his throat, Ezio fears for his own life and that of his father and that of his brothers. He's almost forgotten the interloper when they dash past him, ramming their way through the circle of guards. With a cry of pain and a stumble in their step, they break away and into a run. On their back is Petruccio, he's free!

Father has seen it as well, drawing closer now. "You need to run, on my signal." He's beside Ezio now. "Cover for me," he orders and Ezio does, not thinking overly much as his father reaches for his belt again, this time opening one of the pouches.

Thick grey smoke explodes around them, sending the guards hacking and coughing. Ezio isn't better off, but at his father's cry of "Now!" he sets off running nevertheless. He's out of the smoke in a second, deflects a strike haphazardly and gets a new cut along his shoulder, but he's out of the circle of guards. A look to the side shows Federico running as well.

He can hear father somewhere behind him, calling out and drawing the guard's attention. Ezio wants to look back, wants to see that his father makes it out as well, but there are more guards coming into the piazza and the street he made for is now blocked. So runs up the side of a building, grabbing a handhold and pulling himself up and up until he's on the roof. There is a guardsman there, looking as startled as he is and drawing a sword before Ezio pulls him over the edge.

For just one moment, he hesitates, looking down into the square. His father is still fighting, surrounded on all sides in a tide of armoured guards. Like a demon incarnate, he slashes at them with a sword in one hand and a dagger in the other, but there is no-one protecting his back and-

"No!" It takes a moment until his head catches up, a moment to process that he is doubled over screaming and there is no air in his lungs. There is-

There is blood. Death. There is a hand on his collar and Federico is pulling him away from the roof's edge. He doesn't want to, but he follows his brother. Leaving- leaving his father behind.

When- when had this happened? When have they become criminals?

Ezio stumbles on the roof's tiles, but Federico is pulling him along uncaring of his sputtering and panting. Arrows soar past them, but the guards have fallen back significantly. He follows Federico down some scaffolding and into an alleyway, where he leans against the wall to catch his breath.

Federico is hurt, Ezio realizes, worse than he himself is. There is a heavily bleading wound on his side and another deep gash slicing open the back of his doublet as well as the skin underneath. Still his brother is standing strong.

"No time to cry, brother," Federico says, "We have to find mother and Claudia and get them out of the city."

"And Petruccio," Ezio adds, pulling himself up and wiping at his wet cheeks.

"And Petruccio," Federico agrees grimly.

* * *

Index:

_Et tu brute? _\- And you, Brutus? (Latin; allegedly Gaius Iulius Caesar's last words during his assassination to his confidant Marcus Iunus Brutus, leader of the conspiracy against Ceasar; the quote was popularized by William Shakespeare's _'The tragedy of Julius Caesar'_)


	2. All that glitters is gold

At the hight of summer, it's pleasantly cool along the mountainside. She's pretty sure she passed the border today, not that it matters much, all that matters right now is the sheer drop in front of her and how far she'll have to backtrack to get around it. Off-path hiking can be challenging at times. Gabriel would say she has a death wish, doing crazy shit like this, except he won't and that hurts, no matter how much time passes.

Right, the cliff. Turning, she decides to walk along the edge to see if it leads to a more reasonably steep area. It's not like she's lost or anything, when she pitches her tent in the evening, she'll get out the GPS to locate herself more accurately, but until then it remains switched off to preserve battery, same goes for her phone.

She learned first hand how terrifying it is having to navigate without the help of electronics during last year's Christmas vacation in Greece, when her GPS fried due to what she later learned was a freak solar flare. Hopefully there won't be any more of those, considering how far she's trekking from civilization here.

Idly, she scans the path ahead, looking for any treacherous ground. There is some, but nothing she can't maneuvre around. When leaning over slightly, she can see the bottom of the cliff, where it evens out a little. She's not especially high up in the mountains, much preferring the foothills, so there is vegetation creeping up to the the cliffside, a few gnarly little trees but mostly scrub and bushes. Thick enough to catch her fall, she estimates, not that she particularly wants to find out.

Leaning back again, her gaze wanders ahead, searching for a trail down. It's then that she spots a glint in the underbrush down below. Like a yellow light, probably a reflection of some sort, from the low sun. Huh, is it that late already? Checking her watch, she decides to pitch her tent once she gets down from the cliff. And check out that glint while she's at it, maybe it's a spring or something else interesting.

Some ten minutes later, her eagle eyes spot a slope she could slide down, the loose pebble and stone treacherous to climb, but safe enough to descend. It takes her less than two minutes to make her way down the twenty-something meter incline and another three to empty her shoes of all the annoying little stones they collected. Then she's ready to check out the reflection, if she can find it again.

As it turns out, she can. Find the reflection, that is, though it's not water as she expected. Or, it's not _just_ water. There is a hole in the landscape, as if some giant had taken a scoop right out. It looks decidedly weird. The sides are overgrown with plants and at the bottom water has gathered into a clear still pond, somehow void of algae and animals. She could just fill up her water bottle, pop a pill in and be set for the next day or so, no filter needed. In fact, that's exactly what she'll do.

Using the vegetation as handholds, she climbs down into the subterrane, curiously noting the too smooth quality of the stone beneath the plants. Her feet splash into water once she lets got of the helpful shrubbery. It really is exceedingly clear, more something she'd expect in some tropical paradise and not in some literal hole-in-the-ground in Sweden - or Finland, one of the two. Shaking her head at the absurdity, she drinks the rest of her water, before filling the bottle again.

It's when she's refilling her second bottle, that she realizes something has changed. Looking up, she finds her eyes pulled to the over-grown side of the subterrane to her left. Something is shining through a wall of very-out-of-place ivy. Stowing away her bottle, she stands and approaches the ivy curiously. The only sound she hears beneath the whisteling winds is her boots splashing through the water, all else is eerily still.

Behind the ivy overhang lies a passageway down that opens into a cavern larger than she'd expected so close to the surface. Once she enters, the walls and ceiling light up with bright golden streaks arranged in strangely alluring designs. After a moment to appreciate the alien beauty of the spectacle, she approaches one of the walls and reaches out to run her hand over one of the designs.

The light becomes unbearably bright, searing into her eyes and burning itself into her mind. From beyond the blinding glare, she can hear an etheral voice talking at her.

That is how she learns of the Isu and Minerva's Prophet and of one long-dead, yet still very annoyed, semi-deity looking for a champion to install a glorified anti-virus program on an ancient artifact of power. In the past, of course, because that which is to be prevented has already happened. First she doesn't understand the need to go back that far, but after having the Prophet's life burned into her memory, she sees no harm in arriving a little earlier than strictly necessary.

-o-

Petruccio isn't sure who his savior is. He remembers being in the middle of a fight, his brothers and father crossing swords with the city guards, then he had just been there, pulling Petruccio onto his back like he's a little kid again. His savior had just taken him and run for the hills.

At the city gate, Petruccio had to dismount and walk alongside the man to avoid suspicion from the guard. They still got narrow-eyed glances, but luckily the bells had only started ringing after they were already out of city bounds. With the guards distracted, they were able to hurry out of sight.

Unfortunately, that little bit was as far as Petruccio could walk before succumbing to yet another coughing fit. Much to his embarrassment, the unknown man had to pick him up and start carrying him again. He tried to explain himself, he hadn't been feeling well even before getting arrested and that brief moment of the noose choking him - well, it hadn't helped matters. But the man didn't answer any of his babbling, so Petruccio gave up on it after a while and simply rested his head on the man's shoulder.

They had stopped again only to pick up a huge bag, which the man threw over one of his - and Petruccio's - shoulders. It wasn't comfortable, but Petruccio didn't dare complain, not when the man had just saved his life. Instead he tried to calm his relentless coughing to no great success.

It took until well after midday for his savior's breath to become laboured. He ignored all of Petruccio's questions for his wellbeing, as well as his offer to walk on his own again, merely tightening his hold on Petruccio's legs when he made to get off. Then another hour later, the man began wavering in his steps and finally let Petruccio slide off his back.

Immediately rounding the man, Petruccio is shocked to find his front stained with fresh blood. The man grimaces and presses a hand to his chest, pulling it away and staring at the bright red blood on it.

"You have to go to a doctor!" Petruccio exclaims, before falling into a cough again. He still manages to hear the man repeat "doctor" to himself, seeming thoughtful. Then he shakes his head, and thumps a hand on Petruccio's back not-quite-helpfully.

"No doctor," the man decrees, his words broken and thick with an accent he hasn't heard before.

"But, but you need a doctor," Petruccio sputters, yet the man merely shakes his head with another "no doctor" and looks around. They are on a smaller hillside road with no town in sight except for Firenze's looming walls behind them. There is, however, a small farmstead ahead, something the man picks out as well and starts making for.

Petruccio follows as best as he can, but is still lagging behind the man's long strides. By the time he catches up, his savior has already found the farmer's wife by the house, a baby on her hip and another child behind her legs, and tries to speak with her. It is apparent that she doesn't understand him at all and is disinclined to offer aid to the stranger.

"_Por favor, por favor_," the man says, gesturing with his bloody hand at the woman, unwillingly frightening her, "_por favor_" and clasps his hands pleadingly.

Oh, Petruccio thinks, he's trying to say "please". Stepping up to the pair, he takes over for the man desperately trying to ask for help.

"Excuse me, signora, we are merely looking to for a place to rest," Petruccio explains, trying to hold in another cough, "My companion doesn't speak very well, please don't hold it against him. We only need a roof for the night, please."

"Oh," the woman looks down at him as he loses his fight against the cough and has to turn away, "Oh dear, I don't think we can help you much. We have little to give and less to give away for naught but goodwill." At least she doesn't look as frightened anymore, but-

"We don't have any money-" In the moment he says it, he knows it is the wrong thing to say, her hopeful look becomes downright hostile. She scowls down at him with such a dark look, that he instinctively backs away, searching for aid from his savior. The man meets his gaze and turn to the woman again.

"Please," he says, having corrected his pronounciation, and clasps his hands pleadingly again. The woman turns her attention to him, but doesn't look any more friendly for it. It is only when his savior reaches up to his ear to remove the piece of jewellery stuck to its lobe, that she stops scowling.

In the man's hand is a bright blue stone shimmering prettily, set in gold with a shaft at the back where it had been stuck _through _the earlobe. It was a simple yet beautiful piece of jewellery, no matter the bizarreness of the manner in which it was worn. The jewel alone must hold some worth, though Petruccio knows little of such things.

"Would that be enough to house us until we are well enough to travel again, signora?" Petruccio asks cautiosly.

"What am I supposed to do with a pretty stone?" the woman complains, but seems too intrigued to decline the trade. "Fine," she decides and takes the jewellery, "You can stay."

Relieved, Petruccio lets his shoulders slump and looks up at his savior, who is nodding at the woman. Then he hefts his bag and walks behind the house, Petruccio hurrying to follow him.

Once they are out of sight of the farmer's wife, the man sets his bag down and removes his stained cloak. Beneath are a foreign-looking tunic and hose, made from a material Petruccio doesn't recognize, but then he's not really learned in fabrics either. How he wishes mother or Claudia were here to answer all the questions this savior of his raises.

Then the man pulls the loose tunic over his head with a hiss and Petruccio has to look away, an embarrassed flush rising to his cheeks for the man is not a man at all, but a woman. A woman whose breasts are held tight with another piece of strange fabric, but very clearly a woman still.

For a while he stands there with his back turned and occasionally coughing, until the woman tries to get his attention. "Auditore," she says and there is nobody she can mean than him, so he turns around hesitantly, carefully keeping his gaze on her face and not straying lower. She is smiling at him and he doesn't know what to do with that. It's just a smile, just a friendly smile, nothing to it.

"Auditore," she repeats and gestures for him to come closer, so he does, still hesitant. With a roll of her eye, she waves her hand around until he looks away from her face to follow it. She is holding a pristinely white cloth in her hand. As he is watching, she presses it to a part of her exposed stomach. There is a faded scar there, running the entire length of her midsection from her belly button up to the breast bone disappearing beneath the fabric around her torso. He doesn't know what kind of wound resulted in such a scar and he isn't sure he wants to know either.

"Yes?" she asks and Petruccio has no idea what she means to tell him, but he nods anyway. Then she pulls something away from the back of the cloth and maneuvers it gingerly to her other arm-

Oh, she is wounded there as well. There is a smaller but no less angrily red and lightly bleeding cut just above the elbow of her right arm which she now covers with the cloth. She holds it at an awkward angle before looking up to him. "Auditore," she demands, nodding her head at the piece of cloth. Petruccio comes around to her right side and then, very carefully, smoothes the cloth against her skin.

"Yes." It sounds almost like praise and it is so strange for how much she uses the word. How is her vocabulary so limited? Surely you needed more than a handful words to get this far into the Florentine Republic?

Stepping back, he observes that the cloth sticks snugly against her pale naked skin. She had also bandaged the wound running right unter the cloth holding her-

Blushing, Petruccio turns away again, trying to think of anything but what he has seen of the woman, of his _savior_, that's what he should be focusing on. His brothers would tease him endlessly if they knew he turned his back to a half-bared woman instead of enjoying the sight, like they no doubt would. What became of them? When they left, his brothers and father had been locked in battle. Did they still live? Were they harmed?

"Do you," he starts haltingly, staring out over the farmlands surrounding the homestead, "Do you think Federico and Ezio got away?"

A moment's pause, then she answers. "Yes. Ezio, yes."

Petruccio swallows. He should be happy if even one of them survived the encounter, yet he can't imagine what living without any one of his family would be like. "And Federico? Father? Do you think they still live?"

When a hand settles on his shoulder, he looks up into the sympathetic face of his savior. "Yes, yes," she smiles although it doesn't quite reach her eyes. She ruffles his hair and then speaks in a foreign tongue. "_Alles wird gut, kleiner _Auditore."

He doesn't know what it means, but he leans into the reassurance nonetheless, wishing he might see his family whole and hale again.

* * *

Index:

_Alles wird gut, kleiner Auditore. _\- Everything will be alright, little Auditore. (German)


End file.
